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Just fifteen minutes after the club issued the news of their manager's surprising departure via a brief short communication, the bombshell landed, courtesy of Dermot Desmond, with whiskers twitching in obvious anger.

In 551-words, key investor Dermot Desmond eviscerated his former ally.

This individual he persuaded to join the team when Rangers were gaining ground in 2016 and required being in their place. Plus the figure he again turned to after Ange Postecoglou left for Tottenham in the summer of 2023.

So intense was the severity of his critique, the jaw-dropping comeback of the former boss was practically an after-thought.

Twenty years after his departure from the club, and after much of his latter years was dedicated to an unending series of appearances and the performance of all his old hits at the team, Martin O'Neill is returned in the dugout.

Currently - and maybe for a time. Considering comments he has expressed lately, O'Neill has been eager to get another job. He will view this one as the ultimate opportunity, a present from the Celtic Gods, a return to the place where he experienced such success and praise.

Would he give it up readily? You wouldn't have thought so. Celtic might well reach out to contact Postecoglou, but O'Neill will serve as a soothing presence for the time being.

All-out Effort at Reputation Destruction'

O'Neill's return - however strange as it is - can be set aside because the most significant 'wow!' development was the brutal way the shareholder wrote of the former manager.

This constituted a full-blooded endeavor at character assassination, a labeling of Rodgers as deceitful, a source of falsehoods, a disseminator of misinformation; divisive, deceptive and unjustifiable. "A single person's wish for self-preservation at the cost of others," wrote Desmond.

For somebody who values decorum and places great store in dealings being done with confidentiality, if not complete privacy, here was another illustration of how unusual things have grown at the club.

The major figure, the organization's most powerful figure, operates in the background. The absentee totem, the one with the authority to take all the major decisions he wants without having the obligation of explaining them in any open setting.

He does not attend team annual meetings, dispatching his son, his son, instead. He seldom, if ever, gives interviews about the team unless they're glowing in tone. And still, he's slow to communicate.

There have been instances on an occasion or two to support the organization with confidential messages to news outlets, but nothing is heard in public.

It's exactly how he's preferred it to remain. And that's just what he went against when launching all-out attack on Rodgers on Monday.

The directive from the club is that he stepped down, but reviewing his invective, carefully, you have to wonder why did he allow it to get this far down the line?

If Rodgers is culpable of all of the accusations that Desmond is claiming he's responsible for, then it's fair to ask why had been the coach not removed?

Desmond has accused him of distorting things in open forums that were inconsistent with the facts.

He says Rodgers' statements "have contributed to a hostile atmosphere around the club and fuelled hostility towards individuals of the executive team and the directors. A portion of the criticism directed at them, and at their loved ones, has been entirely unwarranted and unacceptable."

What an remarkable allegation, that is. Legal representatives might be mobilising as we discuss.

His Ambition Conflicted with the Club's Model Once More'

Looking back to happier times, they were tight, Dermot and Brendan. The manager lauded Desmond at every turn, expressed gratitude to him every chance. Rodgers respected him and, really, to nobody else.

It was the figure who drew the heat when Rodgers' comeback occurred, after the previous manager.

It was the most divisive hiring, the return of the prodigal son for a few or, as some other Celtic fans would have described it, the arrival of the unapologetic figure, who left them in the difficulty for another club.

Desmond had Rodgers' support. Gradually, Rodgers employed the persuasion, delivered the victories and the honors, and an uneasy peace with the fans became a love-in once more.

There was always - always - going to be a moment when his goals clashed with Celtic's operational approach, however.

It happened in his initial tenure and it happened once more, with bells on, over the last year. Rodgers spoke openly about the sluggish process Celtic went about their player acquisitions, the endless waiting for targets to be secured, then not landed, as was too often the case as far as he was concerned.

Time and again he stated about the necessity for what he called "flexibility" in the transfer window. Supporters concurred with him.

Even when the club spent unprecedented sums of money in a twelve-month period on the expensive one signing, the costly Adam Idah and the significant Auston Trusty - all of whom have cut it to date, with Idah already having left - Rodgers demanded increased resources and, oftentimes, he expressed this in openly.

He planted a controversy about a lack of cohesion inside the club and then walked away. When asked about his remarks at his next news conference he would typically minimize it and almost reverse what he stated.

Lack of cohesion? Not at all, everybody is aligned, he'd say. It appeared like he was engaging in a dangerous game.

Earlier this year there was a report in a newspaper that purportedly originated from a insider close to the organization. It said that Rodgers was harming Celtic with his public outbursts and that his real motivation was managing his departure plan.

He desired not to be present and he was engineering his exit, this was the implication of the story.

The fans were angered. They then saw him as akin to a sacrificial figure who might be carried out on his honor because his directors wouldn't support his plans to achieve triumph.

The leak was damaging, naturally, and it was meant to harm Rodgers, which it accomplished. He called for an investigation and for the guilty person to be removed. If there was a probe then we learned no more about it.

At that point it was plain Rodgers was shedding the backing of the people above him.

The regular {gripes